Delivering a talk on Corruption in democratic governance,Pandey said that “At present, the total amount of black money in India has been estimated to be in the range of Rs 50,000 crore and Rs 1,00,000 crore. The most worrisome is the fact that even those quarters that are supposed to fight corruption are not totally corruption-resistant”.
Read more: ‘Black money behind politics’

November 2005
Local Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) Scam – ? crores
National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) Scam – 250 crores – Sep 2007 – HC pulls up CBI for not registering case
“I am pained to observe that the law in this country punishes very harshly the small offenders involved in offences of stealing of small amounts to the tune of few hundreds or few thousands. ”Such accused are often sent to jail by the big fishes who defraud the exchequer of crores of rupees…they are dealt with by investigating agencies in a different manner and the law does not act with the same harshness to these offenders,” Justice Dhingra observed in a recent order. ”This attitude of the investigating agencies is beyong comprehension,” he said while directing the CBI to register a case against Pankaj Aggarwal, the alleged mastermind in the scam. Aggarwal has his business in Dubai.
December 2005
Election Fund Scam – ? Crores
Operation Blackboard scam – 1000 crores
Oil for Food Scam – ?

“We are discussing legal recourse to be taken in the Apex Court. We may even file public interest litigation before the Supreme Court asking for intervention in the case. It is a mockery of the law we are witnessing in the case. Scores of witnesses are going back on their words. We may even demand the CBI inquiry into the change of stance by the witnesses,” – Report of Jan 2008

October 2006
West Bengal State Consumer’s Federation Ltd (CONFED) Paddy Scam– ? crore
SEZ Controversies – RBI fears of a revenue loss — some Rs. 170,000 crore over the next five years by way of income tax, excise and customs duties foregone (based on a NIPF study). Read More 1
Dharmesh Doshi, Madhavpura Cooperative Bank scam – 1030 crores
Barak Missile Deal – 400 crore – The CBI case alleges that Rs 2 crore were paid to the president of a political party (Jaya Jaitley), who functioned from the residence of the then Defence Minister (George Fernandes). March 2008 Nandas claim innocence
Blood Test Kit Scam – ?

March 2007
Pune Hassan Ali Khan Scam – 50 crores – I-T department, ED, and IB estimates that several thousand crore rupees were routed out of India(possibly swiss banks) through havala and banking channels. (Read More 1 2)
Congress MP Moni Kumar Subba from Tezpur, lied about his Indian nationality for 16 years manages to scam the country off by 25000 crores
There is little chance of recovery in most of these cases as there are not many assets to recover the arrears, officials claimed.

April 2007
Air Ticket Booking Scam – 13 crores
The Royapettah Benefit Fund (RBF) in Chennai went bust drowning Rs 450 crore and leaving investors and depositors in the lurch a company allowed to operate by RBI.
Fertilizers Subsidies Scam – ? crores

May 2007
Arunachal Pradesh’s corrupt governance: 1000 crores (Read moreMisappropriation under former CM Gegong Apang and present incumbent Dorjee Khandu) Aug 10 – Apang arrested
There were a number of cases regarding mismanagement in the Public Distribution System. People in the villages were not getting enough food allotted by the Centre. Cooperative rural banking scams affected small depositors like labourers and teachers. The hydel power sector was also in doldrums.
Sampoorn Gramin Rojgar Yogana Scam – 457 crores . Dec 07 – Scam referred to CBI.
A muti-crore scam under which the poor were deprived of foodgrains under the state scheme. A systematic loot was taking place in the state and the government was not willing to give permission for holding a CBI probe into the scam running into crores of rupees.
Warehouse Receipts Scandal – 500 crores

July 2007
Stock Holding Corporation of India Limited (SHCIL) Scam – ?
Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWS&SB)Scam – ?
Punjab Public Service Commission (PPSC) recruitment scam – 8 crores
Three judges of the High Court were found taking favours from Ravi Sidhu, former PPSC chairman. On April 19, 2004, 25 sitting judges of the High Court had gone on mass leave protesting Chief Justice B K Roy’s move to seek an explanation from two judges, Justice Vinay Mittal and Varinder Singh, who had allegedly applied for membership of a private golf course, Forest Hill Resort Club. The club was involved in litigation and was later demolished on the orders of the High Court. The club was illegally constructed in complete violation of Forest and Environment laws. Honorary memberships were given to IAS officers and the two judges to legitimise the illegalities

August 2007
Delhi Development Authority canteen owner Ashok Malhotra ownedmore than 50 cars and 10 motorcycles were recovered, all bearing special VIP number plates. Raid unearthed 5000 land documents, ? crores
Former Supreme Court Chief Justice YK Sabharwal was involved in dubious judicial deal-making that earned his sons huge profits. – ? crores
September 2007
Kerala State Cooperative Bank Scam – 2000 crores
Aircraft Import Scam – 1059 crores
Leave Travel Concession (LTC) Scam – loss of Rs 200 crore to Government and PSUs.
Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Land Scam – ? crores
‘ISRO comes directly under the prime minister and it is they who have to launch an inquiry and not us. If they are ready for it, then the state government will provide all necessary help,’ – Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan

October 2007
Das filed the petition challenging the actions of the banks in waiving of around Rs 2,300 crore of public money arbitrarily without any valid reason. Describing this as the largest single waiver in the history of Indian banking industry.
Fake housing projects in north India – 500 crores – Y S Rana from Delhi. Rana was the owner of PS&G Developers and Engineers Ltd arrested by EOW.
Kidney Transplant Racket – ? crores more than a 1000 victims. (Read more 1 2 3 4bar)
Many innocent labourers lost their kidney in lure of money and job.The racket is believed to be spread in various states, including Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan, Haryana, Delhi and Maharashtra. Source
Coal India Ltd illegally diverted at least Rs10 crore from the funds it had collected for over a decade and meant for the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund (PMNRF).
Part of the funds collected at the time of the Kargil war for the NDF have been transmitted as late as 27 August 2007, after the initiation of this inquiry.” The Kargil war happened in 1999.

December 2007
Funds collected for victims of the Kargil war, Orissa cyclone and Gujarat earthquake were misused by top IAS officers in Punjab – the documents prove that officers posted as deputy commissioners in Ludhiana, Patiala and Sangrur misappropriated and misused crores of money while heading the Red Cross societies in their districts.
Lucknow Development Authority (LDA) Land Scam – 6 crores

January 2008
Punjab VB arrests whistle-blower
Punjab vigilance bureau is penny wise and pound foolish. A sub-divisional officer (SDO) who blew the whistle on a scam worth crores was arrested by the bureau in an alleged graft case (see pre 2005 SNC Lavalin). While the SDO has been suspended, his own report on the utilisation of border area funds — exposing what is probably the tip of the iceberg — is gathering dust.

February 2008
Kolkotta Museum Scam – 18 crores
One of the biggest repositories of the country’s cultural and historical heritage, has been siphoning off crores of rupees under the pretext of preserving priceless artifacts, a probe has found.

March 2008
Senior Punjab IAS officer suspended for going out of his way to help a company by hiring it without inviting tenders and extending advances without proper bank guarantees. The company failed to repay, causing loss of Rs 20 crore to the corporation.
KPMG – India is “fraud haven”

July 2008
Parliamentary horse trading – ? crores
Ghaziabad Provident Fund scam – 23 crores – involved 83 accused included 36 judges, including one sitting Supreme Court judge, 11 High Court judges and 24 judges of subordinate judiciary. Beneficiaries of the ill-gotten money which was siphoned off fraudulently on the basis of fake documents and fictitious government servants and withdrawal of crores of rupees from the provident fund account of third and fourth-grade employees in Ghaziabad region between 2001 and 2008.(Read more 1) Chief Justice of India KG Balakrishnan denied heading the bench hearing (Read more 1) Dec 08 – CBI says it would seek permission to interrogate the judges. Oct – 09 – Key accused dies of heart attack while in custody Jul 10 No evidence against 17 out 41 judges and 24 remaining judges
Ghaziabad police sought permission from the Chief Justice of India and Allahabad Court to initiate a probe against the judges accused in this scam. While the Allahabad High Court dismissed the petition summarily, at the Supreme Court, Chief Justice K. Balakrishnan handled the request with remarkable astuteness and ordered a novel method of investigation that would protect the prestige and the reputation of the judiciary as far as possible.

April 2010
President of the Medical Council of India (MCI), Dr Ketan Desai in college scam – 500 crores – Demanded Rs 40 lakh from students seeking admission in a capitation fee racket and money for allotting seat as a management quota student. (Read more 1 2)
Financial Fraud hits 87% of Indian companies

DISCLAIMER: 1 crore is 10 million. All amounts are reported estimates and in Indian Rupees. A “question mark” indicates that the amount of misappropriation is unknown. I tried my best not to repeat any scams and I don’t claim this to be error free. Deriving an exact or a real figure is not possible. Please let me know if there are any corrections or additions that need to be made. My only intention is to bring forward the deep rooted corruption in the system, and it is not to attack or promote any group, person or institution. All links are working as of 17 Feb 2011
I think the Total of 2011 is will be the highest ever in history..

1) 2G SPECTRUM SCAM: We have had a number of scams in India; but none bigger than the scam involving the process of allocating unified access service licenses. At the heart of this Rs.1.76-lakh crore worth of scam is the former Telecom Minister A. Raja who according to the CAG, has evaded norms at every level as he carried out the dubious 2G license awards in 2008 at a throw-away price which were pegged at 2001 prices.

2) Commonwealth Games Scam: Another feather in the cap of Indian scandal list is Commonwealth Games loot. Yes, literally a loot! Even before the long awaited sporting bonanza could see the day of light, the grand event was soaked in the allegations of corruption. It is estimated that out of Rs. 70000 crore spent on the Games, only half the said amount was spent on Indian sportspersons. The Central Vigilance Commission, involved in probing the alleged corruption in various Commonwealth Games-related projects, has found discrepancies in tenders like payment to non-existent parties, will-ful delays in execution of contracts, over-inflated price and bungling in purchase of equipment through tendering and misappropriation of funds.

3) TELGI SCAM: As they say, every scam must have something unique in it to make money out of it in an unscrupulous manner- and Telgi scam had all the suspense and drama that the scandal needed to thrive and be busted. Abdul Karim Telgi had mastered the art of forgery in printing duplicate stamp papers and sold them to banks and other institutions. The tentacles of the fake stamp and stamp paper case had penetrated 12 states and was estimated at a whooping Rs. 20000 crore plus. The Telgi clearly had a lot of support from government departments that were responsible for the production and sale of high security stamps.
4) SATYAM SCAM: The scam at Satyam Computer Services is something that will shatter the peace and tranquillity of Indian investors and shareholder community beyond repair. Satyam is the biggest fraud in the corporate history to the tune of Rs. 14000 crore.
The company’s disgraced former chairman Ramalinga Raju kept everyone in the dark for a decade by fudging the books of accounts for several years and inflating revenues and profit figures of Satyam. Finally, the company was taken over by the Tech Mahindra which has done wonderfully well to revive the brand Satyam.

5) BOFORS SCAM: The Bofors scandal is known as the hallmark of Indian corruption. The Bofors scam was a major corruption scandal in India in the 1980s; when the then PM Rajiv Gandhi and several others including a powerful NRI family named the Hindujas, were accused of receiving kickbacks from Bofors AB for winning a bid to supply India’s 155 mm field howitzer. The Swedish State Radio had broadcast a startling report about an undercover operation carried out by Bofors, Sweden’s biggest arms manufacturer, whereby $16 million were allegedly paid to members of PM Rajiv Gandhi’s Congress. Most of all, the Bofors scam had a strong emotional appeal because it was a scam related to the defense services and India’s security interests.

6) THE FODDER SCAM: If you haven’t heard of Bihar’s fodder scam of 1996, you might still be able to recognize it by the name of Chara Ghotala , as it is popularly known in the vernacular language. In this corruption scandal worth Rs.900 crore, an unholy nexus was traced involved in fabrication of vast herds of fictitious livestock for which fodder, medicine and animal husbandry equipment was supposedly procured.

7) THE HAWALA SCANDAL: The Hawala case to the tune of $18 million bribery scandal, which came in the open in 1996, involved payments allegedly received by country’s leading politicians through hawala brokers. From the list of those accused also included Lal Krishna Advani who was then the Leader of Opposition. Thus, for the first time in Indian politics, it gave a feeling of open loot all around the public, involving all the major political players being accused of having accepted bribes and also alleged connections about payments being channelled to Hizbul Mujahideen militants in Kashmir.

8) IPL SCAM: Well, I am running out of time and space over here. The list of scandals in India is just not ending and becoming grave by every decade. Most of us are aware about the recent scam in IPL and embezzlement with respect to bidding for various franchisees. The scandal already claimed the portfolios of two big-wigs in the form of Shashi Tharoor and former IPL Chief Lalit Modi.

9 and 10) HARSHAD MEHTA & KETAN PAREKH STOCK MARKET SCAM: Although not corruption scams, these have affected many people. There is no way that the investor community could forget the unfortunate Rs. 4000 crore Harshad Mehta scam and over Rs. 1000 crore Ketan Parekh scam which eroded the shareholders wealth in form of big market jolt.